These first days of Fall, I feel my energy levels running a bit low so this afternoon I decided to make a pick-me-UP smoothie from some foods I had stocked in my fridge and pantry. Luckily the energy-boosting ingredients, like organic flax seed and extra virgin organic coconut oil, played together nicely with the other nutritious additions.

It’s important to have a well-stocked kitchen at times like this, when your brain is a bit fuzzy and you are tired. Please see Linda Bonvie’s, “Essentials For a Well-Stocked Pantry,” series for ways to create a healthy kitchen environment in your home.

“Pick-Me-UP during the Fall” Smoothie

Makes 1

• 1 cup water
• 3 ice cubes
• 6 cashews
• ½ cup pineapple, fresh or frozen
• 1 teaspoon extra virgin organic coconut oil
• 1 tablespoon Wild Oats brand flax seed
• 1 cup raw greens, like kale or spinach, fresh or frozen

Blend a-way to help boost your health!

Please share with us your own kitchen concoction energy-boosting smoothie ideas!

I’ve been writing about the wonders of cast iron cookware for 7 years now, so the fact that I could be surprised by anything at this point is amazing. But guess what? I’m surprised to find out that there is one product that could destroy your beautiful pan. You should never use this on your cast iron pan — Dawn dishwashing liquid.

I’m not knocking Dawn as a product, it’s a great degreaser. In fact, it has many uses outside of the dish sink. But the reason that Dawn is the cleanser of choice for removing oil from wildlife caught up in an oil spill is the very reason it is not good for cast iron.

When a cast iron pan is heated with a fat, an amazing transformation happens. The heat causes a chemical reaction in which the fat polymerizes, meaning that multiple individual fat molecules join together to form larger molecules. It is these larger polymer molecules that bind to the metal of the pan and form the seasoning. These seasoning molecules can’t be destroyed by scrubbing or even a mild soap.

But Dawn contains certain types of solvent agents and sulfides that are extremely effective at dissolving oil. A heavy degreaser like Dawn will bind to the oils in the skillet and strip them. This will disturb the seasoning, especially on a newly seasoned pan.

Those solvents that are so helpful when washing a Pyrex casserole crusted with lasagna, will remove the seasoning from your cast iron pan permanently, making it more difficult to get and maintain an even and durable seasoned surface. If you wash your pan with Dawn, you will need to re-season your cast iron. Plus, removing the seasoning can open the door to rust — something you don’t want to get a foothold on a cast iron pan.

There is some controversy about whether it’s necessary to ever use any kind of soap on a cast iron pan. I come down on the no-soap side. A well-seasoned cast iron pan is so slick and pore-less that there is really no need to use soap. A stiff brush and hot water is all I’ve ever needed to remove even the toughest cooked on bits.

Of course, I’ve had my pans for many years. They are indeed well seasoned.

But if you are just beginning the seasoning process, you may have the need to scrub your pan from time to time. And if you do have a stuck-on mess, I can see where you might want to use a bit of soap. But stay away from Dawn.  It will remove your seasoning and make it harder to keep your pans in good shape.

So, bottom line, never use Dawn on your cast iron pan. You might think your getting your pan cleaner, but in fact, you’re making it harder to create and maintain your seasoning. And that’s a big problem when your talking about a useful cast iron pan.

With so many beauty treatments on the market today, it can be difficult to find the right products for you. One promising way to locate effective natural beauty products is to opt for ones that feature ingredients that have been utilized for thousands of years.  Here are some effective ancient natural ingredients that are making their way into modern-day beauty routines.

Calendula
Calendula has a long history of  healing and nourishing the skin. It was used in ancient Greek, Roman, Middle Eastern and Indian cultures as a skin tonic and also as a ceremonial flower. Bathing in its bright orange and yellow petals has been long thought to produce glowing skin.  According to the International Herb Association’s book, calendula has a  “potent and complex array of phytonutrients that helps facilitate the skin’s restorative cycle.” Today, calendula can be found in  Bodyceuticals, which makes a variety of calendula based skin care products for the face and body. Make sure to check out their delicious Body Oil to help soothe skin after shaving.

Dead Sea Salts
Since ancient times, the waters of the Dead Sea have been known for their therapeutic benefits. In fact, nearly two thousands years ago the Historian Titus Flavius wrote that the salts from the Dead Sea heal the human body. The Dead Sea is unique because the salt composition is 27% of various salts as compared to 3% in normal sea water. Furthermore, the salts of the Dead Sea contain magnesium, potassium, calcium chloride and bromides. These beneficial nutrients are said to have many positive effects on the skin and even help heal conditions including acne, eczema, and seborrhea. Furthermore, Dead Sea Salts have even been used for a variety of other complaints including fighting stress and combating hair loss. Look for inexpensive Dead Sea Salts in the bulk aisle at your neighborhood health food store.

Kombucha
Kombucha has fast become a celebrity favorite and a staple in the supermarket, but some don’t realize that it has ancient roots. This fermented, fizzy tea dates back as early as 221 B.C. during the Chinese empire of the Tsin-Dynasty when it was referred to as the “The remedy for immortality.” Although many people drink Kombucha to improve their health, it is increasingly being used topically to beautify the skin. Kombucha’s potential benefits stem from its antioxidant properties and probiotic component, which make it an innovative ingredient to look for in skin care. You can find kombucha in Andalou Naturals and EmerginC, which both offer a variety of highly rated beauty products.

Seaweed
Seaweed is another ingredient that has been utilized for centuries to feed and heal the skin. Seaweed contains a variety of nutrients including magnesium, potassium, calcium, sodium, and iodine. First, utilized in ancient cultures, seaweed baths remain a popular form of therapy in Europe. These renewing baths are often referred to as Thalassotherapy (from the sea) or Balneotherapy (bath) and can be found in some of the world’s most upscale spas. However, you don’t have to travel to enjoy the benefits of seaweed.  The Seaweed Bath Co. makes a variety of bath products, butters and lotions that fight dry, flaking and scaling skin naturally by using a combination of specific species of seaweed to help manage severely irritated skin. This forward-thinking company is the vision of Adam Grossman, a long-time psoriasis sufferer, who created his seaweed-based cosmetic products to take control of his own irritated skin—and ended up helping others in the process.

At a recent dinner party curated for a vegetarian friend, I was surprised to hear some speculation over whether my much beloved broccolini was, in fact, a GMO food. It seems there is a vicious rumor going around about this delightful green vegetable, and after a spate of research I must set the record straight.

Broccolini, along with some other curious produce like pluots, tangelos, honey crisp apples and more, are the hybrid children of their more conventional parents (plums and apricots, tangerines and grapefruit, and macoun & honey gold apples in each case). They are the end result of cross-pollination, an age-old agricultural practice that we humans learned from mother nature herself. In accordance with nature’s laws, the two parents have to be closely related in order to produce a viable offspring. A highly educational article at wellfedfamily.net discusses this in further detail here.

This is distinctly different in practice from the genetic engineering so hotly contested in the debate about our food supply. The GMO foods we commonly encounter are distinctly separate species joined by man to produce certain ‘desirable traits,’ such as hardiness, pest & drought resistance.  This entails the insertion of certain genes from bacteria, plants, animals, insects, etc., into an unrelated species’ DNA.

The conversation around GMOs can tend towards the far extremes- will they solve world hunger, or are they poisoning the food supply? Are they safe for children to eat?  I confess to having an opinion or two of my own on the subject, but for today it is enough to clear broccolini’s name.

Head here to learn more of the mysteries of broccolini.

The pickle “season” is all about the cucumber season. Namely, those thinner skinned, bumpy, crunchy, cute little ‘cukes’ known as Kirby cucumbers. Now is the time when you’ll be able to find lots of really fresh Kirbys.

And what you can do with those Kirbys is to make some of the tastiest pickles ever with very little effort.

Now, I’ve always loved pickles, but never thought that I could make them myself. I admired those who were able to can veggies, but it just seemed like too much of a learning curve.

And then one day a friend told me how easy it is to make refrigerator pickles in no time flat. So I gave it a try and soon was in pickle heaven!

The beauty of this method is that no canning skills at all are required — just canning jars. And after a couple of days in the fridge they’ll taste just as good as any old-fashioned kosher dill out of a big barrel.

If you don’t have any glass canning jars (like the Ball brand), you’ll need to get at least six. Even though we’re not officially “canning,” the canning jar is the perfect container. Plus, they look really cool and will make you appear as kitchen proficient as Martha Stewart when you show off your pickle prowess.

Aside from being a very low-calorie food, cucumbers are pretty high in certain minerals such as phosphorus, magnesium, calcium and potassium. Plus, you can add some other veggies, such as carrots to give your creation even more nutritional value. And if you’re concerned about the salt, the potassium in the cukes helps balance sodium intake.

So give this a try and I think you’ll be very surprised at how delicious they are!

NOTE: Before you slice your Kirbys, since we’re leaving the skin on, give them a good scrub with a vegetable brush under running water. Another plus to Kirbys is that they are almost never waxed. You never want to use a waxed cuke to make a pickle.

Super easy refrigerator pickle recipe

The fresher the cuke, the better the pickle you’ll get. Also, fresher Kirbys have fewer seeds, and will be much crunchier.  I know you’ll want to taste them as soon as possible, but try to give them at least two days to “pickle-ate” in the fridge first.

Ingredients:

• At least 6 Kirby cucumbers sliced lengthwise into quarters. (Take your cucumber quarters and fit them into the jars, packing them in tight. If you’re running short on Kirbys, add some quartered and peeled carrot slices to your jars.)
• 1 ½ cups of apple cider vinegar
• 1 cup of water
• ½ cup of cane sugar (if you like your pickles sweeter, just add more sugar)
• 2 tablespoons kosher or coarse sea salt
• Spices: Whole mustard seeds, celery seeds, whole black peppercorns, whole bay leaf (optional — fresh dill, coriander seeds)

Mix together the vinegar, water, sugar, salt and add a generous teaspoon of each of the seed spices listed above, plus the same amount of black peppercorns.

Bring the spice, sugar, vinegar mixture to a boil and simmer for a few minutes. Make sure the sugar is melted and mix the liquid around a bit.

Meanwhile, poke a few bay leaves into each cucumber-filled jar. If you’re using dill, fit some sprigs of that into the jars as well.

Let the brine mix cool down for about ten minutes, then spoon it into each pickle jar, leaving a little room at the top. The goal is to try and evenly distribute the seeds and peppercorns from the pot into each jar.

Put the lid on, stick in the fridge and that’s it! The hardest part is waiting a couple of days to taste them.

Now, these should last at least a month in the refrigerator (you can write the date you made them on the jar lid). But it’s unlikely that will ever be a problem!